Barbra Streisand recorded here — and so did Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, John Lennon and, uh, The Village People

By Dan Epstein
November 27, 2024

Since it first opened  in 1969, The Hit Factory recording studio has more than lived up to its name, with its various New York City (and, for a few years, London and Miami) locations producing hundreds of hugely successful records spanning the pop, rock, R&B, hip hop, jazz, Latin and holiday genres.

Twenty-five Hit Factory-recorded albums and singles have received RIAA Diamond Awards for selling over 10 million copies, including Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life, Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA and Lauryn Hill’s The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. The Hit Factory has also won 10 “Album of the Year” Grammy Awards, including ones for John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s Double Fantasy, Whitney Houston’s The Bodyguard soundtrack, and Adele’s 21.

In fact, the studio’s impact on the popular music of the last 55 years is so pervasive, you can practically point in any direction at a record store and pull out a Hit Factory-related album. Meat Loaf’s 1978 blockbuster Bat Out of Hell? Parts of it (including Phil Rizzuto’s infamous play-by-play commentary on “Paradise by the Dashboard Light”) were recorded at the studio’s original 353 West 48th Street location. U2’s legendary 1983 live LP Under a Blood Red Sky? It was mixed at The Hit Factory’s second location at 237 West 54th Street, which the studio’s main operations moved to in 1981.

Eric B. & Rakim’s classic fourth and final album Don’t Sweat the Technique? The hip hop duo recorded, mixed and mastered the entire thing in 1991 and 1992 at The Hit Factory Times Square, which Hit Factory owner Ed Germano — who bought the original studio in 1975 — opened in 1987 at 130 West 42nd Street. Mariah Carey’s perennial holiday smash “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” which you’ve probably already heard more than enough of these last few weeks? A product of the Hit Factory Headquarters, which opened in 1992 at 421 West 54th Street.

And as is being revealed at The Hit Factory Entertainment Collection — a massive current music memorabilia auction hosted by New York’s Eaton & Brennan Auctions — it’s similarly easy to randomly point at any Hit Factory-related album and find a Jewish connection. In fact, the studio’s original owner, R&B songwriter and producer Jordan “Jerry” Ragavoy, was the son of a Hungarian-born Jewish optometrist.

“People want to think of us as only the managers or accountants for the bands and artists,” says University Archives memorabilia authenticator John Reznikoff, who is collaborating with Eaton & Brennan on the auction. “But of the 500 gold or platinum albums or awards that are in this collection, I’ll bet you a hundred have some ties to Judaism, either through the artist, musicians who played on it, the producers or songwriters. Considering the size of our population, Jews really have an outsize influence on popular music as a whole — going all the way back, not just on rock and roll.”

The Hit Factory auction — which closes Dec. 4 and features over 600 musical treasures from the personal archives of Danielle Romano — will likely draw the most attention (and bids) for the 1920s Baldwin piano from Miami’s Criteria Recording (which was under Hit Factory ownership from 1999 to 2012) that was used on Derek & The Dominos’ Layla, The Allman Brothers’ Eat a Peach, and The Bee Gees’ Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, among many other notable recordings, and over two dozen John Lennon-related items including original candid photos from the final Double Fantasy sessions and signed artwork from Lennon’s Walls and Bridges album.

But the auction is also offering numerous Gold and Platinum albums awarded to The Hit Factory by the RIAA for the studio’s collaborations with Bob Dylan, Barbra Streisand, Carly Simon, Lenny Kravitz, Billy Joel, Neil Diamond, KISS, Robbie Robertson, Bette Midler, Adam Sandler and Jerry Seinfeld. And then there’s the Gold record for The Village People’s 1979 album Live and Sleazy, which — much to Reznikoff’s surprise — also has a Jewish connection. “While I was researching that album,” he says. “I found out that [producer] Jacques Morali and [songwriter] Henri Belolo were both Moroccans of Jewish origin. That was an interesting nugget that I hadn’t expected.”

Paul Simon is also well-represented in the auction, having recorded several albums there over the years, including his landmark 1986 release Graceland.

“Paul was always lovely to work with,” said Danielle Romano, who began working at the first West 54th Street location as a receptionist while still in her teens, before moving to accounting and then handling booking for her father’s studios. “My dad and Paul got along really well, and my dad would always re-tune the room for him. I remember when my dad first heard the final mix of Graceland — he just looked at Paul and said, ‘This is incredible. I don’t even know if you realize what you’ve done.’ He honestly felt that Paul had no idea how big it was going to be.”

Romano also has fond memories of Barbra Streisand, who worked on her Back to Broadway and Higher Ground albums at the second West 54th Street location. “Oh my God, I loved her,” she says. “She walked around with her bag of DAT tapes, and she knew exactly what she wanted the music to sound like and how she wanted it. She really knew her business.”

According to Romano, artists like Simon and Streisand were initially attracted to The Hit Factory for its high-end studio equipment and hitmaking reputation, but it was a combination of family warmth and ironclad privacy that kept them coming back.

“We didn’t advertise — it was all word of mouth,” she says. “And basically, whatever you needed, we made sure you got it. I’ve even made the studio look like a barn — I filled it with hay — to make one country artist feel more at home. I was on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Which unfortunately wasn’t so great for me,” she laughs, “but it was great for other people.”

“Artists also knew that their music wasn’t going to be leaked,” she continues. “No disrespect to any other place, but that was a big problem in the industry, and we had it on lock really well. And we didn’t go into the sessions to listen unless they invited us in; anyone who worked for us was told in advance that you didn’t ask for photographs, no autographs, nothing. Because the people were here to work, and we wanted them to be comfortable and creative and not feel like they’re being watched, or that someone’s gonna ask them for something. And if you didn’t want a record executive in the room while you worked, we weren’t going to let them in. We had no problem saying to anyone, ‘Nope, sorry. The sessions are closed off!’”

Now located in New York’s at 676 Broadway in New York’s NoHo district, the latest incarnation of The Hit Factory is owned and run by Troy Germano, Danielle’s brother. Now happily retired from the business, Danielle Romano says she’d love it if the studio her father ran for decades is remembered not just for the hits it produced, but also for how well The Hit Factory treated artists regardless of their stature.

“My dad would always say to me, ‘Just remember, that next demo that comes in from a young artist, that could very well be the next Bruce Springsteen, the next Paul Simon, or the next Mariah Carey. You give them the same respect that you give the well-established artists.’ And I was like, ‘You got it.’ It always made sense to me that we’d treat everybody the same, and treat them fairly and kindly. And I hope people saw that and recognized that.”

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